


Understanding

by stillskies



Category: Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-04
Updated: 2012-03-04
Packaged: 2017-11-01 03:41:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/351583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stillskies/pseuds/stillskies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If he couldn't be normal, he at least didn't want to deal with Schuldig.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Understanding

**Author's Note:**

  * For [chaineddove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaineddove/gifts).



> Originally posted 11-13-2006

There were days that Naoe Nagi wished that Brad Crawford had left him on the street where he had found him. He wished that he didn’t have the powers that made him such a valuable asset of Esset, and that he could go to a normal school and have a normal life.

He had not wanted to live with a man who knew his every move before he had even thought it. He did not want some crude German probing his mind, gliding through his deepest thoughts and sifting through memories he’d rather forget. He was tired of having to subdue his Irish roommate every night so that Schuldig and Brad could fasten the restraints.

No. If he couldn’t be normal, then he’d rather still be on the streets, scrounging for food in garbage cans.

Instead, he sat for hours in front of the bright glow of a computer screen, fingers flying over keys as he typed up mission summaries and researched the latest hit. He maintained the charade of normality when he was forced to go to school, but he sat in classes, learning things he had long since learned, and was made painfully aware of how different he was from everyone else his age.

He was almost positive that none of the teenagers in his class had to clean blood out from under their fingernails, or could stop a bullet in midair by merely looking at it.

There were advantages to his situation, however. Granted, he knew that anyone with a basic knowledge of hacking could accomplish the same feat, but the people that he interacted with didn’t have the time nor the inclination to use backdoor pathways to leave messages on the computer of the mercenary group who happened to be dead set on killing their client.

At first, it had merely been research. Crawford had ordered him to dig up whatever files Weiss had on the Takatoris, and it had merely been coincidence that Bombay had been instructed to the same to their computer.

Nagi’s first impression of Weiss’ tactician was that he was skilled. Had Nagi not been attempting to hack into Bombay’s terminal at the moment his enemy tried to slip into his, he’d never have known that his computer had been infiltrated. The thought had made Nagi uneasy and he began to wonder how many times Bombay had done this.

Bombay had been the first to initiate contact. Nagi knew it wasn’t hard to get someone’s messenger information, but he’d never have expected the other teen to send him a message.

Conversation had been stilted at first, each of them trying to guard as much as they could. Nagi kept hearing the whisper of a thought in the back of his head, and he was wary of Bombay’s seemingly innocent gesture of friendship, and he knew that his not-quite friend was worried about giving out information that could be used against his teammates.

They had taken to hacking into each other’s computers after run-ins and leaving messages blinking on their word processors. It had shocked Nagi at first to find that Bombay was skilled enough to do that without leaving a trace of having intruded, but he had quickly gotten over it as he’d sat down to read Bombay’s note.

That night, he went straight to the computer and made his way through the firewalls and protective software that his counterpart had installed. He quickly typed his message and erased every trace of having been in the system.

He woke the next morning to a message flashing on his screen and an offer to meet after classes for dinner.

It took the better part of the morning for him to decide whether he was going to show, but Brad’s smirk and Schuldig’s knowing grin told him that they knew his decision before he even left for school.

He may not be normal, he decided on his way to the rendezvous point after school, and he may have psychotic teammates, but at least there was someone out there who understood the majority of what he had to go through.

Bombay stood two feet away and met his eyes.

“Hello, Nagi-kun,” he said, smiling brightly.

Nagi half-smiled in return. “Hello, Omi.”


End file.
